A piece of paper in an HR file by itself will not fire/deny a raise to/deny a transfer to this guy. So the question he should ask is
Does my supervisor care about this? Probably worth talking to them about it anyway to make sure everything is cool, or find out how the boss wants him to deal with something like that in future.
Is there any chance some potential future supervisor at this company will read this without talking to his current supervisor to get the real deal anyway? If so-- which isn’t all that likely – then maybe he should consider requesting a chance to put his own statement in the file. But balance that against the fact that it will tick off HR even more.
What did I do to piss off HR and what can I do to make things better in the future. Again, if your superisors loves you, HR is pretty irrelevant, but it can’t hurt to be nice to them.
This is basic HR protocol in most large corporations. Verbal warning from your immediate supervisor/manager comes first. If the employee fails to rectify his/her behavior, then comes the written warning. In most places I’ve worked, the employee is called to the HR office and, in the presence of the HR rep and the supervisor/manager reads, discusses, and signs (or not signs) the paper. The paper is put in the employee’s file.
Most corporations allow X number of written warnings before they initiate any other proceedings, including firing.
An employee may not be considered promotable depending on how many written warnings are in his/her file. I’ve seen that happen too.
I work at a major university and I was dragged to H.R. last year due to a situation in my office. One that never should have gone to H.R. in my opinion, mind you. But I wasn’t in charge of the situation so it did. I liked to believe that at a university (as opposed to a company in the private sector) that H.R. would be more useful. I was wrong. As uncomfortable as I’d become with a certain co-worker I was 1000x less comfortable with the H.R. person who was assigned to “help” with our situation. In short - in my view the H.R. person not only didn’t help, she made things much WORSE (at least for me). All I can say is this: that I hope I NEVER have to deal with that H.R. person ever again, and - don’t go to H.R. if it can POSSIBLY be avoided. H.R., in my opinion, is of NO USE whatsoever.
Man, where do you work that you’ve never even heard of the concept of being written up by HR? And are they hiring? Every corporate job I’ve had, the primary mechanism by which HR justified its existence was by writing up employees for exceedingly minor violations of arbitrary company policy.
Yep. And there’s a big reason behind it as it documents the problems the employee has had so that if the have to be let go or denied unemployment, the paperwork is there.
HR exists to protect the employer from liability, either from Government regulators, or civil lawsuits. Everything they do is filtered through that lens. If you ever thought that they were there for the benefit of the employees you are mistaken.
Well, I’m not saying that the person in the OP warranted the write-up, but chances are he’s a person that the company wants gone and so they’re building up the documentation to make that happen.
Icarus is pretty much correct, especially in larger organizations. We are here to make sure that the company is in compliance with all federal, state, and local laws touching on employment, discrimination, hiring, compensation, etc. That’s not a bad thing, if you assume that the laws themselves are there to protect the employees in the first place.
In my personal experience, most HR folks will try to do what’s right and fair for the employees as well – but, especially when you have employees in conflict with each other, someone is always going to e unhappy with the resolution.
In this case, it’s simply impossible to know what happened based on the cryptic second-hand testimony in the OP. I’ve had to deal with employees before who have inserted themselves into situations or conflicts that did not involve them: they call themselves ‘peacemakers’ but often they only escalate the conflict or worse, cause it to spread to others. I’m not saying the OPs friend IS a troublemaker; they may truly be innocent, but you cannot tell based on their own statement.
Secondly, unless it was an ongoing problem, I’d be pretty frustrated with someone who complained to HR about getting ‘dissed’. I expect people to act like adults and resolve minor personality conflicts between them. However, I definitely want to know if we have a potential hostile work environment issue to investigate.
Anyway my point here is that although HR is not primarily working for you; they are there to enforce compliance with the laws that protect you and all employees from the company and from each other. And secondly, regarding the issue in the OP - there is really no way to tell from this description whether the HR person acted appropriately or not. Either way, the company may have a formal appeal process (ours does). Check the employee handbook and see if there is anything about ‘alternative dispute resolution.’
Agreed on the need for HR to provide CYA to the employer. I wanted to fire an employee when I took over a department, HR told that there was nothing noted in their file to warrant the firing, and that I needed to build a case. I started having to do write-ups on the person, and 6 months later I could finally get rid of the dead wood. This was in the public sector.
When I took over a dept. in the private sectors, I was briefed on one of my employees who already had two strikes on them. I got to deliver the 3rd. Again, the file made a difference.
In all cases the employee was given the chance to file a response with the write-up. The OP should get a meeting with HR and their supervisor and find out the procedure for at minimum filing a response to the allegation. Good companies let you do that.
I mean I’m familiar with the concept of raising an issue to HR. But usually it’s something really serious. Like the time one of our guys freaked out at a client site and disappeared for a week and we found him in his hotel re-enacting that scene from The Recruit where Colin Farrell washes out of The Farm and goes on a bender.
But I’m not really familiar with the type of formal “write up” the OP is describing. It sounds almost like the sort of thing where if you show up a few minutes late to work, you get a bunch of demerits and a letter in your file or something.
Honestly, I’m like the senior manager of my group and I wouldn’t even know how to “write up” an employee. I’d either tell my practice director or Amy* from HR that I have a problem with one of my people. If the problem continued, they get shitty performance reviews and eventually my boss might decide to fire them.
*Not her real name
The reason that write ups are normally required before you can fire someone is so that if they come back and charge you with unlawful termination or discrimination, you can prove that the termination was warranted by their performance. Something egregious can still get you fired immediately (like workplace violence), but otherwise the company may have to defend a termination decision in court. Especially if the employee is disabled or a member of a protected class, which is LOT of employees.
You can fire them anytime you want in most situations (at will employment, no union). However, if you write them up ahead of time, your chances of having your unemployment insurance get dinged go way down since they can’t make a claim if they are fired for cause (or if they make a claim, you can show your documentation and it is likely to be denied).
Frankly, the friend can’t screw HR or the company. He can’t sue for being written up. If he cares, if he sees economic consequences, he could sue - in which case he needs to write a letter stating why he disagrees with the action and have it filed with HR - his boss and the HR rep should sign and date a copy he keeps. That’s the employee version of CYA HR style. But if his wife has a ton of money, its probably better to screw the company by giving notice and moving on - timing it for busy season.
I’m betting the same as where I work: nothing would get you written up. One of my coworkers got a stern talking to about her personal life causing excessive absenteeism and they had a meeting about how to help her deal with those issues (drug addicted ex making her and the kids’ lives hell) but no one has ever been formally punished for anything that I’m aware of.